


These Days

by zephsomething



Series: Surviving the War [36]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-24
Updated: 2019-11-24
Packaged: 2021-02-27 01:47:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21549505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zephsomething/pseuds/zephsomething
Summary: Hermione and Pansy have A Conversation where they both start ready to fight.
Relationships: Hermione Granger & Pansy Parkinson
Series: Surviving the War [36]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/813804
Comments: 2
Kudos: 18





	These Days

**Author's Note:**

> For any younger folks reading I've seen a lot of confusion lately about it, relationships with the / are romantic, relationships with the & are platonic. Just so y'all know.

Hermione tucked the parchments into her bag as she power walked through the halls of the ministry, she had to get these petitions to the right people as soon as possible and her memos tended to get ignored if she wasn’t there to glare at people. She was only a dozen feet from the lifts when someone she recognized got off of one. As soon as she met Pansy Parkinson’s eyes they both skidded to a halt. Hermione’s hands still half in her bag tucking parchment rolls into their places and Pansy leaking ink from her quill onto the parchment she’d been writing on.

As soon as she saw her Hermione thought of the last article she’d seen with this girl’s name attached in the paper and she sneered. People were hailing her as the next Rita Skeeter and Hermione had always hated bullies, especially ones who never grew up. “I suppose you’re here to find more lies about good people?”

“I’m trying to avoid outright lies these days.” Pansy shrugged but didn’t argue the point, she didn’t insult Hermione either though and that was enough to make her pause. Her pause was apparently all the invitation Pansy needed. “Do you have any idea what it’s like to be raised to this? You had bravery in every bone of your body before you even stepped foot on the express and I listened at doors as every adult I knew and looked up to talked about purity and the things it meant.”

Hermione opened her mouth to snap something out, something about excuses and choices but Pansy was shaking her head so Hermione paused. She took a breath instead and listened, Andromeda’s advice hadn’t failed her yet. 

“It’s not an excuse, a reason maybe, or an explanation but I’m not excusing the choices I made.” Pansy gave her a small sort of smile and shrugged. “But we were children, do you know the sorts of things Gryffindors heroes got up to at school? But they get to grow up and be men, brave and heroic. I just get glared at in the street.”

“Maybe they grew up.” Hermione glared, snapped the words out in a tone that implied Pansy hadn’t.

“Some of us are trying to be better these days.” She shrugged again and tightened the silver and green ribbon that tied her hair out of her face. “We can’t be someone we’re not though.”

Hermione thought for a moment, let the words sink in. She’d spent the last few years learning how to listen for the truth in what people said. “You sound like Andromeda. Have you met her?”

“Not exactly.” Pansy lifted her shoulder in a half hearted shrug. “She’s Malfoy’s aunt though, I’ve seen her around.”

“If you’re trying to be better how do you explain the things you write?” Hermione asked, she still read the prophet from cover to cover every morning. There was no way around the fact that Pansy’s articles were mean, written to drag their subjects down.

“I don’t write anything that isn’t true.” Pansy tucked the quill behind her ear as she spoke. “I’m only really good at one thing but I’ve stopped twisting half truths into lies because they sound better.”

“You’re going to make a lot of enemies.” The warning was out before Hermione even thought about it, it was the same thing Andromeda kept telling her.

“They’ll have to get in line.” The grin she gave her was all teeth, the kind of thing that held challenge. It was almost a question in and of itself.

“If you ever want a source I’m easy to find.” Hermione nodded.

“I might take you up on that one day.” Pansy nodded as well and looked down the hall, past Hermione. “My current source is about to run off though so I’d best be going.”

“Go ahead, I’ve got to get people signing papers.” Hermione nodded and headed towards the lift.

Two days later Pansy’s article ran in the paper. It was about a wizard in the muggle department who was trying to use his not inconsiderable pull in the ministry to convince people that something needed to be done about the muggles. The wizard himself was unavailable for questioning but most sources said the man often sounded like he thought there were altogether to many muggles around. He was quoted by sources as saying that the sheer number of muggles living in Britain was a threat to wizarding society.

After reading the article Hermione sent Pansy a box of sweets on her way into the office. It wasn’t exactly an apology but it was a peace offering of sorts. Not long after that they started meeting for coffee, or lunch occasionally. It was never planned, just whenever they happened to run into each other and have time.

**Author's Note:**

> Also Pansy's parts in this series were, as many things in this series were, sparked by me relistening to/rereading old interviews that JK did about the characters. Pansy in particular she wrote off as 'just being mean and awful' which I thought was bloody rich considering she let Malfoy, Snape, and James grow and change and become (in her opinion) Good People.


End file.
